Yes, another Chef's Knife!!

[Jeff the Millwright]

Here is this week’s chef’s knife. I used my homemade natural gas forge to heat up the knife and then textured the blade with the round end of a ball-peen hammer. I heat treated though in my Evenheat oven again to 66 Rockwell at quench and tempered back to 61.


The handle wood is Mountain Mahogany, which is only slightly softer than Ironwood, and even though I have had some for a while I have never used it before but I am amazed at how beautifully this wood buffs out like glass. I sanded in stages to 2000 grit and then buffed with a dry cotton wheel and added one coat of Tung Oil and buffed again. Just wish this wood was more figured.


Barring some unforeseen problem, I am planning to sell my next chef’s knife. This weekend I am heading up to Toronto to pick up some better and some stabilized wood for the knives I will be selling soon.

 

[Jeff the Millwright]

Here is the wood I picked up in Toronto today.

All the wood in the first pic is stabilized.



All the wood in the second photo is unstabilized. The piece on the right is Kingwood and the centre two are Cocobolo and the small piece on the left is African Blackwood I am going to use for accent bolsters.



Really looking forward to next weeks knife with my new wood!!!

 

[John mc c]

Nice knife and that wood looks sweet
Careful with that blackwood, highly toxic dust

 

[Jeff the Millwright]

Thank you John, I appreciate the comment and especially the warning about the toxic dust. I was going to do some research before I used the Cocobolo because I knew it was an irritant but I didn’t even realize Blackwood was also toxic until you let me know.


It was pretty sobering to read that Cocobolo is not only an irritant but also a sensitizer. I don’t have any dust collection system in my shop which is in my garage so if I do get sensitized it may be a nightmare trying to get all the dust out of there so I’m thinking I may stay away from any wood that is a sensitizer, it just doesn’t seem worth the chance. Again thanks for the warning.

 

[Jeff the Millwright]

Here is last week’s chef’s knife. Again it is 1095 steel but with handle material of Kingwood this time. The piece I used was half sapwood and half heartwood giving a dramatic contrast.

 

[Hengelo_77]

That thuya burl looks good in the picture.

I like how you used wood with sap wood, I like the contrast.
I would have oriented it the other way around myself (not saying that that is better)

 

[Teppojutsu]

Nice wood and work!

 

[Jeff the Millwright]

Thank you for the comments Hengelo and Teppojutsu!


I actually like your idea Hengelo about orienting the sapwood around the other way because it would look cool to have the sapwood in the bolster area. Unfortunately, the piece I have I don’t think is wide enough to use that way but I will keep it in mind when looking for wood in the future. My only concern is the grain would be going across the knife then but I don’t know if that really matters. Thanks again for the comments guys.

 

[l1ranger]

very nice - i like the "little" detail of aligning the grains on either side of the handle - very nice touch

 

[scott kozub]

I'm in Niagara.

Where in Toronto are you getting stabilized wood? I've played with home stabilizing but like the idea of professionally stabilized wood.

BTW, love the lines of that knife.

 

[Jeff the Millwright]

very nice - i like the "little" detail of aligning the grains on either side of the handle - very nice touch

Thank you l1ranger, I appreciate the comment. I do try and line up my grains and with a lot of knives my blade on my table saw takes a cut about the thickness of the knife handle material so it comes out looking pretty natural.

I'm in Niagara.

Where in Toronto are you getting stabilized wood? I've played with home stabilizing but like the idea of professionally stabilized wood.

BTW, love the lines of that knife.

I got the stabilized wood at, Artistic Wood and Tool Supply, 50 Venture Drive, Unit 4 Toronto. It is the only retail place I know of in Ontario that has stabilized wood. They had a pretty good selection with maybe a few hundred pieces and I found the stabilizing to be well done; when I cut the blank open it had been penetrated all the way through. Here is a pic of a knife I have for sale that I used a piece of the stabilized Thuya Burl, in the earlier pic in this thread, for the handle if you want to check it out. https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/chefs-knife-for-sale.1622348/ You might want to check out Exotic Wood, at 5229 Harvester Road Burlington, ON L7L 5L4 on your way home from Toronto as it is just off the QEW. They don't have any stabilized wood but a good selection of exotic woods.

Thanks for the comment about my knife too!!

P.S. I am staying away from Cocobolo because my eye is still swollen from getting the dust in it from sanding yesterday. Nice wood but to me not worth it.